It is about the ‘thanatotheristes degrootorum’. “Thanatos” is the Greek god of death and “theristes” is Greek for mower. That is why the new dinosaur is nicknamed ‘reaper of death’. The bone remains of the dinosaur were discovered in 2010 by a Canadian couple on the banks of a river in Alberta.
Monstrous appearance
It is an impressive animal with a height of 2.4 meters and serrated teeth like steak knives 7 centimeters long. From snout to the tip of its tail, the dinosaur was 8 meters long. In comparison: this is the length of four king-size mattresses in succession.
Like other tyrannosaurus species, the reaper of death had strange “bumps” on its skull. This gave him a monstrous appearance.
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The reaper is also called the nephew of the T-rex. The new species was smaller than the T-rex, which lived around 12 million years later.
The research shows that not all tyrannosaurs were giant meat eaters such as the T-rex. There would be many subgroups, each with its own terrain, hunting style and body type. With this discovery, researchers hope to be able to chart how the T-rex became the most powerful predator.
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It is unknown why these tyrannosaurs had such different body types and main shapes. Researchers suspect that this has to do with the differences in food.
External differences
These differences outline a larger theme in the research: different groups of tyrannosaurs belong at different times and in different places. The dinosaurs did not always stay together.
The characteristics of tyrannosaurs differ per region. The light-built relatives, such as the albertosaurus, tended to live farther north. While the older species with shorter, bulldog-like snouts resided more in the south.
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